Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

It's getting on for midnight, so we can proceed with a new Magic Monday. Ask me anything about occultism and I'll do my best to answer it. With certain exceptions, any question received by midnight Monday Eastern time will get an answer. Please note:  Any question or comment received after then will not get an answer, and in fact will just be deleted. (I've been getting an increasing number of people trying to post after these are closed, so will have to draw a harder line than before.) If you're in a hurry, or suspect you may be the 143,916th person to ask a question, please check out the very rough version 1.0 of The Magic Monday FAQ here. Also: I will not be putting through or answering any more questions about practicing magic around children. I've answered those in simple declarative sentences in the FAQ. If you read the FAQ and don't think your question has been answered, read it again. If that doesn't help, consider remedial reading classes; yes, it really is as simple and straightforward as the FAQ says. 

The picture? A magical altar. In the traditions of the Fellowship of the Hermetic Rose, this can be any flat surface large enough to hold the four working tools of the elements, the four elemental candles, and the two pillars. In ritual, it represents the world -- meaning here both the microcosm of yourself and the macrocosm of the universe. A ritual itself forms a mesocosm that mediates between those two extremes and is capable, within the limits of magic, of making changes in either or both.

As the image above suggests, an altar can be very, very simple.  A lot of mages I know, in and out of the traditions John Gilbert taught, have used the kind of little folding table I grew up calling "TV trays" as altars -- they're convenient to put up and take down, and can be stored folded up for the many times when you're not doing ritual. Throw a colored cloth over it and you're good to go. Black is standard in most Golden Dawn-derived traditions, representing the opaque world of matter, but you can use other colors for specific symbolic purposes.

Of course you can get much fancier than the simple FHR approach; the image on the right shows a Golden Dawn altar kitted up for a ritual, and the one below shows a Martinist altar similarly bedecked. In magic, as in most things in life, you can get as simple or as fancy as your heart desires.

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I've also had quite a few people over the years ask me where they should buy my books, and here's the answer. Bookshop.org is an alternative online bookstore that supports local bookstores and authors, which a certain gargantuan corporation doesn't, and I have a shop there, which you can check out here. Please consider patronizing it if you'd like to purchase any of my books online.

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With that said, have at it!

***This Magic Monday is now closed -- as in, NO MORE COMMENTS WILL BE PUT THROUGH. See you next week!***

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Over the past week, I had the odd experience of suddenly coming across mentions of a book I had never heard of before several times in a row. I lost track of whether it was two or three times, and then thought, “If it happens again I’ll consider it the third time.” (Keeping in mind the power of three.)

The very next time I went on the internet, mention of the author was the first thing I saw (in a comment on an unrelated article). Definitely a “whoa” moment.

So, I take it I should probably seek out this book, which is Michael Heiser’s “The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible.”

https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-unseen-realm-recovering-the-supernatural-worldview-of-the-bible-michael-s-heiser/6895426

My question:

1.) Have you encountered this phenomenon of suddenly seeing references to something repeatedly, and is it generally a good thing to follow up on when it happens? (Using one’s own discernment or divination of course.)

2.) Have you or anyone here in the commentariat read this book or any others by Heiser? And if so, any thoughts?

For context, I have also been reading Stephen de Young’s “The Religion of the Apostles: Orthodox Christianity in the First Century” which apparently overlaps somewhat with Heiser’s book. I’m a kind of “weird” Christian with sympathies toward the sacramental churches, and I was previously an Orthodox catechumen, but I haven’t joined a particular one.

Thanks in advance!

[(Anonymous)]

1) St Teresa talks about this being one way the Holy Spirit will talk to us or steer us in a certain direction. I’ve had similar experiences and don’t think it’s “just a coincidence.”
2) I’ve read De Young’s book and a lot of Lord of Spirits transcripts. Following your link, looks like a lot of heavy overlap. I haven’t read Heiser’s book but an looking forward to your book report!
Less overlap, but Meditations on the Tarot is really good if you haven’t read it. One chapter covers the multiple falls, I think the chapter on the Tower.

[boccaderlupo]

RE: 2) I've read some of Heiser's articles, mostly related to the Divine Council scenes in certain Biblical texts. Worth reading, if that is your speed. My impression was that he's more writing to an audience that assumes the Biblical books were written in a strictly monotheistic context, whereas there are numerous indications starting in Genesis through at least Psalm 82 suggesting henotheism. In a similiar vein, From Gods to God : how the Bible debunked, suppressed, or changed ancient myths and legends by Yair Zakovitch and Avigdor Shinan.

Axé,
Fra' Lupo

[ecosophia]

1) Good heavens, yes. It happens to me tolerably often, and yes, it's usually a good idea to follow up on it.

2) No, since I don't follow a Biblically based religion it's never been of interest to me. Anybody else?